Monday’s Mantra

“Likes” & “Loves”

Welcome to Monday’s Mantra & Coffee Hour with Chicklit Power and Trench Classes United. I’m so glad there is you to share this journey with. Grab your favorite break-time drink and come in as I continue the saga of being without a publisher!

One of my closest friends called me the other day to tell me she sent me an email containing a blog post that she thought would speak to me. She’s really sweet like that…and yet, there are times that I wish she wouldn’t be so sweet! You know what I mean? She speaks truth into my life, and there are times when that truth just hurts! Are you catching what I’m throwing at you? Well, those types of friends are the best for us, truly, especially if our heart is after God’s heart, and hers is and so is mine, so it’s a good thing. Anyway, let me share my experience of reading this blog post by Rebeka Lyons. It was called audience of one, I believe.

It started with her experiences as a speaker/author, and her striving to get where she thought she should be and how one night in her hotel room after a speaking engagement, that ultimately led her to her knees, a most painfully beautiful place to land. As I read of her experience, I could feel every feeling she was writing, as if I was right there with her, down on my knees! Because when it’s all said and done, I know that that truly is where it all begins: on my knees and often on my face! There are just those times when we have to bow down in order to get up! Some of my biggest breakthroughs have come from humbling me in this way.

Anyway, as I read her blog, I nearly stopped breathing as the truth of her words hit a bulls-eye, right smack in the middle of my heart, and conviction began to ooze out and a holy presence filled my space. My eyes filled up, blurring my vision but still I could see: “I don’t live as if you are enough.” Ouch!

I so related to her confession of counting the “likes” or “hearts” on her stuff she puts out there, her heart soaring when there were many, and plummeting when there were few.  Why is it we base our self-worth on how many “likes” or “loves” we get on something we post on social media? Where does our confidence truly come from? It’s a frustrating conundrum truly, because my editor from New York actually told me last week, “Your platform’s too small. You need to get your numbers up because your social media platform has become just as important as what you write”!

So how does one get away from the necessity of social media? Well, maybe we ought to consider why we’re posting what we’re posting. Is it for attention, popularity, to fulfill a need, such as being liked, loved and accepted? Or is it simply to encourage, lift up, inspire and motivate?

We have got to remember who we’re really posting with! See, we can’t do it for Him because if we do anything “for” Him, it’s in our own strength and often for own need or purpose; but to partner “with” Him before we hit that “post” button, well then we’ll never run out of strength…or words and the “likes” and “loves” won’t matter because our Audience of One loves it and isn’t that all that really counts?

As I finished reading Rebeka’s blog, she cited something that she heard Ann Voskamp speak, and the echo of it is still speaking to me as I write this for you:

“Those who keep score in life just want to know that they count. When you work for an audience of One, you always know that you count.”
My Coffee Hour friend, maybe it’s time to stop counting the “likes” and “loves” and trust that if we’re trying to send a message of encouragement to anyone, He will carry it right to the hearts that need it, and in the process, as it picks up speed in cyber space, the seed will scatter and reach many unseen “likes” and “loves.”
Love,

Evinda